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Is Barack Obama in some sense Clinton 2.0 when it comes to the public’s perception of what the candidate could do for the economy? Just as Clinton benefited in 1992 from a feeling of economic malaise in the country, so too is is Obama getting advantages from the public’s having announced to pollster’s that the […]

It is typical of the atmosphere in America today that the New Yorker cover caricaturing the Obamas is called offensive by the Obama campaign but virtually no one is talking about how demeaning it is of American Muslims. A little detail like that. Imagine if a US candidate had been depicted as an Orthodox Jewish […]

First, he sang ‘bomb, bomb, bomb/ bomb, bomb Iran’ to the tune of the Beach Boys’ ‘Barbara Ann.’ Now, on being told that Iran has increased its importation of American cigarettes, he quipped “Maybe that’s a way of killing them.” Let us review the things wrong with this statement as a joke. First of all, […]

The USG Open Source Center reports on reactions in Iran to the possibility of the opening of a US interest section, i.e. a muted embassy, in Tehran. OSC Report: Iran — Reaction to Mottaki’s Comments on Possible US Interest SectionThursday, July 10, 2008 . . . ‘Iran — Muted Reaction to Foreign Minister’s Positive Comments […]

My column in Salon.com: ‘The FBI’s plan to “profile” Muslims’: It’s unconstitutional, un-American — and it might hurt, rather than help, the FBI’s effort to stop real acts of terror. Excerpt: ‘ The U.S. Justice Department is considering a change in the grounds on which the FBI can investigate citizens and legal residents of the […]

Six are dead in a terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Istanbul. The dead were 3 Turkish policemen and the three attackers, who appear to have been angry amateurs. The identity of the group behind the attack is not yet known. Aljazeera International’s Hoda Hamid reports from Istanbul: As Hamid notes, this attack comes […]

A White House spokesman emphasized that US-Iraqi talks on a Status of Forces Agreement do not include mention of a hard date for US withdrawal. The disclaimer came after Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki for the first time spoke of seeking a timetable for the withdrawal of US troops. Al-Maliki is under pressure from the […]

In the months since my last post “On Mercy and Redress,” The List : Project to Resettle Iraqi Allies has grown in scope as well as in influence, but it still has a long way to go to fulfill its goals. Kirk W. Johnson, the creator of the Project has testified before congressional committees and […]

Napoleon’s Egyptgot a notice in the NYT “Paperback Row” by Elsa Dixler. ‘NAPOLEON’S EGYPT: Invading the Middle East, by Juan Cole. (Palgrave Macmillan, $16.95.) Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt — the first modern incursion by the West into the Middle East — is often remembered as the beginning of Egyptology or a template for Napoleon’s later […]